Swami Prasad Maurya, Leader of Opposition in Uttar Pradesh quits: He has done great favour to BSP says Mayawati

Lucknow, June 22: Former Uttar Pradesh and Bahujan Samajwadi Party supremo Mayawati on Wednesday faced an embarrassing situation after the party senior leader Swami Prasad Maurya quit from the party and accused her of auctioning election tickets for the upcoming Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections.

Mayawati, who addressed a press conference today, suggested that the Bahujan Samaj Party is happy with the resignation of senior leader Swami Prasad Maurya.

“Swami Prasad Maurya has done a great favour to BSP by quitting the party. If Swamy Prasad Maurya wouldn’t have quit the party, we would have had to expel him,” the BSP supremo said.

The former Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister retorted back on the allegation of selling tickets for upcoming state assembly polls as she says, “Maurya himself believed in dynasty politics and thus, always expected favours from the party. He sought election tickets for his son and daughter on numerous occasion, which we couldn’t provide. I had to finally tell him that we can only provide the ticket to you and not to your family, which must have offended him.”

Adding further, she said, “Since his children wouldn’t be given tickets, he left the party and has alleged that I am auctioning election tickets. Maurya could be joining a party which promotes dynasty politics.

She further claimed that she had warned Maurya multiple times regarding his engagement in the ticket business and that that led to the downfall of the leader.

Earlier today, in a major jolt to BSP, its National General Secretary Swami Prasad Maurya tendered his resignation, saying he felt suffocated and accused Mayawati of selling election tickets. “I feel suffocated and cannot continue in the party anymore,” he said at a hurriedly-convened press conference,” Maurya had said.

“Tickets are being openly auctioned by Mayawati on a large scale. She is not making the right choice of candidates. Tickets are not only on sale in the party, they are being auctioned,” he had added.

Maurya, who is the Leader of the Opposition in the state Assembly, left BSP amid speculation that he might join the ruling Samajwadi Party and could be made a minister when Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav expands his Council of Ministers on 27 June.

In a major jolt to BSP, its senior leader Swami Prasad Maurya quit the party today, saying he felt “suffocated” and accused its chief Mayawati of “auctioning” tickets for next year’s Assembly polls.

Reacting to the development, BSP supremo Mayawati said, “Swami Prasad Maurya has done great favour to BSP by quitting the party.”

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Maurya, who is the Leader of the Opposition in the state Assembly, left BSP amid speculation that he might join the ruling Samajwadi Party and could be made a minister when Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav expands his Council of Ministers on June 27.

“I feel suffocated and cannot continue in the party any more,” he said at a hurriedly-convened press conference here.

“Tickets are being openly auctioned by Mayawati on a large scale. She is not making the right choice of candidates. Tickets are not only on sale in the party, they are being auctioned,” he added.

During his interaction with mediapersons today, Maurya said Ambedkar dedicated his life for the sake of ensuring rights to the Dalits and BSP founder Kashiram too spent his life to strengthen the party and give the Dalits their rightful place in the society.

“But Mayawati deviated from their principles and stooped to the level of not only selling party tickets, but auctioning them to the highest bidder,” he alleged.

“…it is worse than auctioning. In auctioning tenders are floated. But here bidding is done repeatedly,” he alleged.